Dave Filoni on Expanding The New Republic Era in THE MANDALORIAN - "The Empire Is Acting More Like the Rebels"

One of the many things that The Mandalorian Season 3 revealed to us is that Empire is alive and well and making big plans to strike back. Moff Gideon’s forces are only one part of the Imperial Remnant, which is led by the Shadow Council, and the resurgent Empire is just waiting for Grand Admiral Thrawn to make his return, which will happen in Star Wars: Ahsoka later next year.

I love that Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni are exploring this aspect of the story, the state of the Galaxy after the Empire was defeated. As we’ve seen, the New Republic is trying to build something better and new, but they are struggling. It certainly doesn’t help that former Imperials have been reintegrated into society and are secretly helping the rise of the Empire.

During an interview with Empire, Filoni talked about expanding on The New Republic era in The Mandalorian and the other Star Wars shows that he’s working on such as The Book of Boba Fett, Ahsoka, Skeleton Crew, and his recently announced film. There are a lot of stories to tell in this era, and Filoni is obviously having a fun time with it. He explains:

“I always relate to my own Star Wars experience and think, ‘How can I give kids now [that] feeling?’ Something that I understood as a kid was the conflict established in A New Hope – the Rebels versus the Empire. I thought something in the Expanded Universe that was very easy to understand was, in the New Republic and the Remnant Empire, that the tables have turned a little bit.”

He went on to explain that the Empire that's acting more like the Rebels, saying:

“It's actually the Empire that's acting more like the Rebels, because their resources are on the downside. But the New Republic is struggling because, while they're all trying to work together, they have different ideas about how to be effective. That was an interesting story. And I think it creates a big piece of history where you can tell all kinds of stories.”

This is going to make for interesting and dynamic storytelling within the Star Wars universe. The New Republic is facing some big challenges as they try to build something new and all of that is at risk with the rise of the Empire. They won’t have a chance to get to the solid footing they need to be at before the Empire returns as the First Order. Filoni went on to say:

“If you took and placed Mando in the original trilogy time-period, you would understand what's going on, because you understood the politics of the day. Now, we've had to establish – starting in Mandalorian, and the idea with Werner Herzog that there were Remnant Imperials still operating – that there's a Remnant Empire, and a New Republic. We really only got around to [exploring] the New Republic with [the] X-Wings in the first two seasons, and we finally went to Coruscant in this latest season. So everything builds a little bit, as we're fleshing out this part of the galaxy.”

It’s pretty cool and exciting to know that everything they are doing with these shows is building to an epic film that will “close out” the interconnected stories. We’ve still got a long way to go, but I sure am going to enjoy the ride that takes us there!

Are you looking forward to more stories set in the New Republic era?